The Present

Annie Dillard wrote an essay entitled "The Present" in her Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. In this piece, she implores: "These are our few live seasons. Let us live them as purely as we can, in the present."

This is my goal. Especially as of late. I have come to the realization that, in my desperate attempt to have a life full of meaningful experiences, I have actually been missing them. I rush from one thing to the next filling a punch-card rather than living a full life. I have to do everything. Be everywhere. All at once. I have been looking back, trying to write down important moments in my life and I feel like I have a very shallow reservoir of memories. I don't know if there's some deep, dark Freudian reason I have blocked them all out...or if I have simply been too busy to remember.

Part of this busy life is not my fault. I think it stems naturally from being poor. My family never had much money. And then I went and got married when I was 20 and had even less. Poor kids don't get to luxuriate in the college experience. They get to work for food and rent and take 18 credits a semester to avoid paying for an extra one and hope they don't run out of money before they get a degree. So, in my desperate attempt to get everything I wanted out of college and keep my head above water, I ran myself ragged. I really had no choice. But I do now.

My husband has a reliable, grown-up job that can mostly pay the bills (with my part-time efforts supplementing things). We have never before experienced the growth of our savings account. It's a remarkable thing. I'm not saying that we no longer stress about money (by any means). Our measly little bank account is probably less than many middle-class Americans spend on their family vacations. But I'm saying that I do not hyperventilate daily about how our bills will be paid. And, hopefully, that will afford me some time and energy to practice living in the present.

Another author whose thoughts on the here and now has been coming to mind lately: Thoreau's pledge to "live deliberately" has always resonated with me.

In Walden, Thoreau writes:

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life...

That is what I long for. Living deliberately. Sucking the marrow out of life. Well, that is a slightly more carnivorous version of what I hope to do. My greatest fear is the discovery "that I had not lived." And this blog is supposed to help keep me in check. My goal is to write about everything. Seriously. Because I feel like my memory has atrophied. And I need to stretch it.

It makes me think of the movie "Harriet the Spy" that I was fairly obsessed with for a period of time in junior high. She and her notebook are inseparable and there is one point in the movie when she says, "I wanna see the world, and write down everything!" And my little heart would swell at the thought of that. So, I donned my best spy-esque "trench coat" (I think it might have been a rain coat, actually...) and, pen in hand, stalked around the aisles of my parents' grocery store, observing people.

Anyway, now I'm rambling. So, I leave you with more Dillard until next time:

"...beauty and grace are performed whether or not we will or sense them. The least we can do is try to be there."

from "Heaven and Earth in Jest" within Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious

I have so much to write about. I'm the worst about keeping up with this. In the near future you can look forward to a post about my friend Erin's wedding (at least one, it was quite the trip!), a visit to E.A. Poe's grave in Baltimore with my friend Tami, spring wrapping its tendrils around the city of Chicago, my expansive windowsill garden, and more...

But today I will write about my mom.

You may think your mom is fantastic--and I'm sure she's pretty swell--but I'm here to tell you that my mom is the ultimate, most extraordinary mother. Most extraordinary woman. She's supercalifragilisticexpialidicious. You know that part in Mary Poppins where Bert is singing the song with all of the different names in it and then ends with: "But the cream of the crop, the tip of the top, is Mary Poppins and there we stop!"? Well, that's my mom.

This is her on her 50th birthday. I had seen a painting at a museum in Grand Rapids that looked just like her! (Doesn't it?!) So I made her pose for it. She thought it was a riot. I thought she looked fabulous. :)

She is one of the most compassionate, empathetic people I know. She does not discriminate or judge. She gives you the benefit of the doubt even when you don't deserve it. She loves unfailingly. Anything I know of grace and unconditional love I have learned from my mother.

I was listening to Pandora the other day and a song popped up called "Virginia" by Ron Pope. I had never heard of this song or artist before, but I'm pretty sure he knows my mom:

"I grew up in the kind of place you have to pass
When traveling somewhere else
My mother laughed more than she cried
But when she cried
Well it was something everyone felt."

She is so kind and unassuming and genuine that you can't help but laugh when she laughs and cry when she cries. At least I can't. All my mother has to do is sniffle, even over the phone and I'm sobbing like an infant. And then she cries harder because I'm crying and in moments we've exhausted an entire box of tissues. It's probably good we don't live together anymore. Our natural resources might not survive it. We felled an entire forest the night we decided to watch Stepmom. What a mistake!

My mother is the portrait of selflessness. (Probably to an unhealthy degree, actually. But that's a conversation for another time). She would read to us almost every night. Even when she was exhausted. Sometimes the three of us would lay on my brother's bed while my mom fell asleep in the middle of one of Grimm's Fairy Tales. We would elbow her in the side saying things like "That's not how it ends!" and "Do the voices, mom!" Poor thing. Or sometimes--if she really wanted us to fall asleep--she would sit on the floor in the hallway that connected my room and my brother's and she would read to us both from there. She taught me to read, to write, to make dandelion bracelets and sandcastles, to do the monkey walk and sing a hundred silly folk songs from her childhood. She taught me to appreciate the little things in life like the sound of a mourning dove and the smell of lilacs.

My mother runs a small grocery store in an impoverished community in northern Michigan. The store was my father's entrepreneurial venture that she is now responsible for. The shelves are half bare and the tile on the floor is peeling up in places and the employees can't seem to get along... but the customers love my mother. Because she loves them.

She does not judge them for their meager situations. She helps them count their money because they never learned to. She asks them about their families, not because it's polite, but because she hopes they are well. She remembers the names of their children. She lets them take their milk and bread home and pay her later because their family is hungry and they don't get paid until Friday. I really don't know if the place has turned a profit in the decade and a half we have owned it--something is always broken, expired, stolen... And I honestly don't know how much longer she can keep it up... (Truthfully, I hope it's not much longer because she needs a break!) But I do know that the community is better for her presence. Not the store, her. You can get eggs and cheese anywhere, but she is invaluable.

I stumbled across a quote online that was credited to Mark Twain (but who knows, the site didn't look very legitimate). At any rate, it's a great one for my mom:

"A mother had a slender, small body, but a large heart--a heart so large that everybody's grief and everybody's joy found welcome in it, and hospitable accommodation."

This is so true of my mom. Where others in my life (*cough* my dad *cough cough*) have shown prejudice, bitter grudge holding, and conditional approval, my mother has been an unfailing example of wide open arms that bear acceptance, forgiveness, and unconditional love. I owe her everything.

I could ramble on about her attributes for days, but I'll spare you any additional gushing. Those of you who know her already know all of this because it is so apparent in her life. And those of you who don't know her will have less tolerance for long adorable stories about her :) So, I will leave you with an adorable picture or two of my mom and I over the years:


Just a bit of resemblance ;)

Down the Rabbit Hole

Ed started his new job on Monday. A real, grown-up, salary-paying, 401K contributing job. And we feel like we're living in a foreign country all of a sudden. The language of career employment is so far removed from the language of poverty and part-time minimum wage. A week ago we were comparing the price of Aldi milk to the price of Wal-Mart milk (Aldi almost always wins, FYI). We were deciding if the whole grain bread was worth the extra $.70 as opposed to the whole wheat. We were determining which fruit we were going to buy this month: apples or bananas. Bananas are much cheaper...but they spoil much more quickly. And I just don't have the time to make all that banana bread. Plus, walnuts are expensive, and what's a good loaf of banana bread without a few walnuts?

Then we woke up one day and we had fallen down the rabbit hole. Things looked different. It was fascinating, unbelievable, and a little bit frightening. And we're still reeling from the landing. Everyone sounds like the March Hare. We need a translator. Suddently we're looking over health insurance paperwork (what the hell is an HMO and why is it so expensive!?), deciding how much to put into a 401K each pay period (What does 401K stand for, anyway?) and looking at apartments that would be conveniently located between both of our jobs (What are the views like above ground?). I feel like we are living someone else's life. Like we won the lottery. Because, not only will Ed be getting paid a salary (what?!) but he really thoroughly enjoys his job. Granted, it's been three days, but so far so good.

I find myself peering around hypothetical corners in our new world, looking for the Queen of Hearts, expecting to have my head chopped off now that we have glimpsed financial security. On one hand this new job brings an enormous, long overdue sigh of relief. Ed has been dilligently, daily searching for long-term employment for at least two years. On the other hand it ushers in a fresh batch of insecurities. What happens when we move into the new, larger, more expensive apartment and start buying spinach and CDs and then Ed loses his job? Do we wait for happiness until we're certain? But how can one ever be certain of anything? We could put an arbitrary expiration date on the uncertainty: "If you still have your job in a year, then we'll be ok" and then in 13 months we could be right back where we started.

Ed and I were talking about all of this and he said: "Isn't there some quote about how the only thing we can be certain of is uncertainty?"
Me: "That's like 'the only thing to fear is fear itself'--it's crap! I'm still afraid. That's not helpful at all.
Ed: "No, it isn't helpful. But it definitely applies."

There don't seem to be many aphorisms to help us figure this one out. I think the only thing to do is jump. I have crunched the numbers. I have made the spreadsheets (yes, plural. So very many spreadsheets). And I just have this sense of inner peace about it all...which is a very unfamiliar feeling to me, so I'm still making sure it's peace and not indigestion... But so many things have been lining up in the past couple weeks that look a lot more like provision than coincidence and I feel like it would almost be rejecting a gift not to run with it. Even if I feel like I'm running with all the grace and coordination of a new-born giraffe.

Ready... (No) Set... (NO!) Go! (Umm, ok!)

Crying for the Cranes

This extraordinary thing happened to me when I got married--I got infinitely more emotional. Well, to be fair, I got more emotional about things regarding marriage. It's the reason that the movie Date Night made me cry, as well as laugh. And the reason that I am apparently very concerned about Niles Crane's open-heart surgery on last night's re-run of Frasier. I have no emotional attachment to the Crane family. I barely watched the show the first time around (though I could probably sing you that quirky theme song about tossed salads and scrambled eggs. But that's just because it's catchy). However, when we stumbled upon a re-run that had Niles on a hospital bed and Daphne in tears in a waiting room, I found myself crying as well. I'm not sure what, if any conclusions to draw about this...I just find it so interesting. And it's probably another reason that I shouldn't have children: I'd be an emotional wreck! I could never watch anything...

You can't send a letter to a bird

From The Piano Has Been Drinking to You Can Never Hold Back Spring, Tom Waits is a master wordsmith. He has incredible versatility and the ability to completely immerse the listener in the world he creates. In an industry that gives precedence to a 3 and 1/2 minute dance beat and feels the need to release a "remix" of Like a G6, it is encouraging to have a diamond in the rough like Tom Waits.
He is more like the diamond and the rough... His haggard, vagabond appearance; his bohemian stage presence; his vocals that land somewhere between Louis Armstrong, John Wayne, and a dusty pipe organ--this man is a marvel. A true artist in every sense of the word. Watching videos of him perform Chocolate Jesus, I couldn't tell if he was in a concert hall or under an overpass. And the beauty of Tom Waits is that he seems ideally suited for both. He's kicking up sawdust. He's warbling into a megaphone. He's jauntily tipping his cap. And I imagine he'd be doing this even if no one was watching.

I recently learned that his poignancy extends beyond his hand-crafted story-songs and onto the printed page. Waits is releasing a limited edition book of poetry on Feb. 22 entitled Seeds on Hard Ground. It is available for pre-order on his website. And the U.S. store is already sold out. There are only going to be 1,000 copies of this book worldwide and all proceeds go to benefit homeless services in Northern California.

If you miss your chance or don't have the funds for a limited edition (like myself), all is not lost. An abridged version of the poem Seeds on Hard Ground will appear in another book entitled Hard Ground where it will be paired with photographs by Michael O'Brien. O'Brien's photographs of the homeless were said to have inspired the poem by Waits.

With my love of language, my appreciation of photography, and my compassion for, as Waits puts it in his poem "those left exposed," I am eager to see how the words and images of Hard Ground work together for good.

Here's a sneak peak of a few pages of Seeds on Hard Ground that Waits posted on his Flickr site:



A few of my favorite moments:
. . .

When I was born
My folks wept at my beauty
I was the package that all
Their good luck came in
I was bright and shining, magnetic
And flaming
Am I just something that got eaten
By the gods
And I only just the bag
That it came in
My parents were good people
Shirley and Raymond
They prayed for a child
Just like me
They prayed for a child
Just like me
. . .

Home is a place
To get a letter
If they can find you
I have heard
Because you can't
Send a letter
To a bird
You can't send a letter
To a bird
. . .

God, may we all
Amidst the storm
Safe by a fire
Bright and warm
Send to those
Left exposed
Good will and a
Much wider brim
The keep the pelting rain
From hammering them
. . .

See I remind them all
That there is a bottom
A bottom
I remind them all
That there is a bottom, Lord
Oh yes, there is a bottom indeed
Yes there is a bottom
And it looks just like me
. . .

I am homeless
But I am moving
I am homeless
But I am moving
Maybe I'll take the hound down
Maybe I'll take the hound
Where the grass is green
And the barn is red
Where the wind makes
The trees look like hula girls
Maybe I'll take the hound down
Maybe I'll take the hound
. . .

I'm the bursting bubble
My crown is my hat
When it comes to trouble
I'm the king of all that
. . .

There is also an incredible description of heaven that takes you down the rabbit hole on page 8-9 that I won't write out here to save some length and some intrigue. :)

a little pick-me-up(beat)

It is cold. Bone-chilling cold. And right about now is when I feel there is no end in sight. Actually, that weight normally presses down on me in February, but it's a bit early this year. Our bills are high (screw you, People's Gas) and our spirits are low. We've turned down the furnace and piled on the blankets and will only watch comedies in attempt to brighten our mood. Or musicals. Because when we dance along it warms us up.

When I get like this I try to force myself to do a little bright-side thinking. Tonight the universe lent a helping hand in the form of a drunken, accordian-playing, broken English speaking, Polish man that staggered into the coffee shop where I work. He began telling us his name was John (I think?) and playing polka and asking if the one other customer in there was my husband or boyfriend. I was trying to communicate with Accordian John but all I could comprehend were a few stray syllables steeped heavily in alcohol.

The smell of coffee and vodka fumes swirled around him, but this was overshadowed by the deafening sound of that accordian. I had forgotten how loud they are! Well, I don't know if I had ever really known how loud they were since I have not had very many close encounters with accordian players... At any rate, the volume of the instrument surprised me and all I could do was laugh about the whole thing. I wanted to immediately call my mother who always seems to wind up in similar situations--maybe it comes with the territory of owning/ working at a small business?

While I was enjoying the story-worthy aspects of this event, I was also not going to survive much more of the super-sonic accordian. I wasn't sure if our one customer was up for it either (or all the potential customers that walked right past the door when they heard the ruckus). I finally said, "No polka, thank you" and poor Accordian John looked up at me with his sad, drunk accordian eyes and squeezed out a few last meloncholy notes. "Sorry," I said. And he sort of shrugged, mentioned again that he had been in Chicago twenty years and got up to leave.

I tried to get him to take his coffee to go (because it really smelled like he could use a cup) but he just said goodnight and staggered out onto the sidewalk. My night was made. I'm glad there was at least one customer to witness the whole thing. And that he seemed to be as excited about it as I was.

Thank you, Accordian John, for helping to keep my winter blahs at bay.